{UAH} The university is not a technical school

The university is not a technical school

SATURDAY NOVEMBER 24 2018

     

Moses Khisa 

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By Moses Khisa

Makerere University has endured years of crises, yet there is something special and incomparable about Makerere – it is the closest to a true university in a poor African country. 
There has been runway proliferation of universities in Uganda in recent years, often driven by warped capitalist desires for profit, but in a sense it's difficult to look beyond Makerere. Given Makerere's innumerable problems, one wonders the magnitude of scandal and decay going on in the countless other universities, particularly those owned by individuals.
Trapped in problems, the topmost officials at Makerere betray a chilling poverty of what a university stands for and what it seeks to do. A few years ago, the Makerere University Council chairman, the highest decision-making body, kowtowed to President Museveni's wish of determining the university curricular. 
Apparently, the President wants Makerere to teach certain courses and not others. But we know that Mr Museveni's competences are not in the area of university education, rather he's known as a star specialist in violence. From where then does he derive the wisdom to impose himself on the content of university education? It comes down to two things. 
First, Mr Museveni's exaggerated belief that only he knows Uganda's problems and has all the solutions. It is the kind of narcissism that is not uncommon among authoritarian rulers. 
Second, it is also an issue of the supine character among many of us Ugandans and the tendency to pontificate so as to procure financial concessions. 
Wana Etyem and other top officials at Makerere genuinely belief that they can supplicate before Mr Museveni (and especially since his wife is the direct supervisor of Makerere, yes, the First Lady of Uganda is also the Minister of Education), which is the only way to endear to the man and ease Makerere's endemic fiscal dilemmas.
There is something else at stake here too: a flawed understanding of the role of the university. Mr Museveni is very much aware that when he speaks of 'useless courses', he means it in political and not functional or technical sense. He knows that the university is not there to purely service the labour market and produce technocrats. He is aware that one need not go to the university to acquire the most basic technical skills and competences – vocational schools and tertiary institutions are very well-suited for that purpose.
The role and standing of the university, and here I am speaking in singular terms to refer to that institutional site that meets a very specific standard, has been and remains the subject of intense debate. 
Mahmood Mamdani has defined the issue in terms of relevancy versus excellence – what the university does for society and what it does for itself. This also speaks to the divide between the public intellectual who is committed to societal causes and the scholar who is focused on professional, scholarly success. 
The supposition here is that being relevant to society as a public intellectual necessarily undermines scholarly excellence. That is, immersion in the rough and tumble of the social and political world does not sit well with dedication to the life of the mind. But this is a most misleading claim. 
There is no inherent contradiction between seeking relevancy and maintaining excellence. In fact, the two can be mutually reinforcing. 
Any university worth its name must be located in concrete social circumstances and must belong to a specific societal setting. If it has no relevancy to society, then it has no meaning and bearing. Similarly, a university that single-mindedly panders to society and purports to be driven by public sentiments without due regard to adhering to certain standards is not worth its name. A university must belong to society, but it must not be driven by cheap populism.
The institutional space and site of a university such as Makerere carries unique currency. It is arguably the only place where individuals can ponder the unimaginable and do the unthinkable. 
Historically, it is out of the university that radical ideas are born and creative destruction is pursued. It is the university space that makes possible asking certain questions and providing courageous answers. A real university is not a technical school. And Mr Museveni understands this.

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